4_5942784413107489227 (1).pdf

Published by Macmillan Education Ltd. © Macmillan Education Limited, 2021.
Home >> Adults >> General English >> NEWS LESSONS
Dutch couple become Europe’s first inhabitants of a 3D-printed house
Level: Advanced
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Warmer
a. Put these types of accommodation in order from 1 (the one that you would most like to live in)
to 6 (the one that you would least like to live in). Give reasons for your choice.
a houseboat
a flat in an apartment building
a caravan
a detached house
a terraced house
a country cottage
Key words
a. Fill the gaps in the sentences using these key words from the text.
affordable boulder bricklayer bunker fairytale (adj)
nascent nozzle overhanging plot proliferate
squirt (v) tenant texture touch (n)
1. People who lived in a rented house or flat are known as .
2. A / An is a room or set of rooms with very strong walls, built
underground as a shelter against bombs.
3. A / An is a very large rock or piece of stone.
4. A / An is a piece of land used for a particular purpose.
5. If something is described as , it is just beginning or has been
formed recently.
6. If things , they quickly increase in number or amount.
7. A / An is a narrow part at the end of a tube through which a
liquid flows.
8. If something is , it sticks out from an edge above something.
9. To means to make a liquid move with a lot of force.
10. is the way that something feels when you touch it.
11. A / An is someone whose job is to build walls using bricks.
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2

Level: Advanced
12. A finishing is something that you add or do to make
something complete.
13. If something is described as , it is extremely beautiful.
14. If something is described as , it is cheap enough for ordinary
people to be able to buy it.
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Level: Advanced
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Daniel Boffey
A Dutch couple have become Europe’s
first tenants of a fully 3D-printed house in a
development that its backers believe will open
up a world of choice in the shape and style of
the homes of the future. Elize Lutz, 70, and
Harrie Dekkers, 67, retired shopkeepers from
Amsterdam, recently received their digital key –
an app allowing them to open the front door of
their two-bedroom bungalow at the press of a
button. “It is beautiful,” said Lutz. “It has the feel
of a bunker – it feels safe,” added Dekkers.
Inspired by the shape of a boulder, the
dimensions of which would be difficult and
expensive to construct using traditional
methods, the property is the first of five homes
planned by the construction firm Saint-Gobain
Weber Beamix for a plot of land by the Beatrix
canal in the Eindhoven suburb of Bosrijk.
In the last two years, properties partly
constructed by 3D printing have been built in
France and the US, and nascent projects are
proliferating around the world.
But those behind the Dutch house, which has
94sq meters of living space, are said to have
beaten their rivals by being the first
legally-habitable and commercially-rented
property where the load-bearing walls have
been made using a 3D-printer nozzle.
“This is also the first one which is 100%
permitted by the local authorities, and which
is lived in by people who actually pay to live
in this house,” said Bas Huysmans, chief
executive of the construction company that
built it.
The first completed home of Project Milestone,
a partnership with Eindhoven University of
Technology and the local housing corporation,
was due to be put on the rental market in 2019,
but the challenges of the architect’s design,
which involved overhanging external walls,
caused delays.
The 3D-printing method involves a huge robotic
arm with a nozzle that squirts out a specially-
formulated cement, said to have the texture
of whipped cream. The cement is “printed”
according to an architect’s design, adding
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layer upon layer to create a wall to increase its
strength. The point at which the nozzle head
had to be changed after hours of operation is
visible in the pattern of the new bungalow’s
walls, as are small errors in the cement
printing, perhaps familiar to anyone who has
used an ink printer.
But while it is early days, the 3D-printing
method is seen by many within the
construction industry as a way to cut costs and
environmental damage by reducing the amount
of cement that is used. In the Netherlands,
it also provides an alternative at a time when
there is a shortage of skilled bricklayers.
The new house consists of 24 concrete
elements that were printed layer by layer at a
plant in Eindhoven before being transported
by lorry to the building site and placed on a
foundation. A roof and window frames were
then fitted, and finishing touches applied.
By the time the fifth of the homes is built –
comprising three floors and three bedrooms –,
it is hoped that construction will be done wholly
on-site, and that various other installations
will also be made using the printer, further
reducing costs.
“If you look at what time we actually needed
to print this house, it was only 120 hours,”
Huysmans said. “So all the elements, if we had
printed them in one go, it would have taken us
less than five days, because the big benefit is
that the printer does not need to eat, does not
need to sleep, it doesn’t need to rest. So if we
started tomorrow, and learned how to do it, we
could print the next house five days from now.”
Lutz and Dekkers, who have lived in four
different types of home in the six years since
their two grown-up daughters left the family
home, are paying €800 (£695) a month to live
in the property for six months from 1 August,
after answering a call for applicants on the
internet. “I saw the drawing of this house and it
was exactly like a fairytale garden,” said Lutz.
The market rent would normally be twice that
being paid by the couple. “Did we earn money
with this first house? No,” said Huysmans.
“Do we expect to lose money on house number
two, three, four and five? No.
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Level: Advanced
“With 3D printing you generate a huge creativity
and a huge flexibility in design,” he added.
“Why did we make so much of an effort to print
this ‘rock’? Because this shows perfectly that
you can make any shape you want to make.”
Yasin Torunoglu, alderman for housing and
spatial development for the municipality of
Eindhoven, said: “With the 3D-printed home,
we’re now setting the tone for the future: the
rapid realisation of affordable homes with
control over the shape of your own house.”
© Guardian News and Media 2021
First published in The Guardian, 30/04/2021
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Level: Advanced
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3
4
5
Comprehension check
a. Answer the questions using information from the article.
1. How do the tenants of the 3D house open its front door?
2. Apart from the Netherlands, in which other countries have house partly using 3D been built?
3. In what way is the Dutch 3D house the first?
4. What challenges of the architect’s design caused delays in the construction of the house?
5. How does the cement in the 3D-printing method create a wall??
6. How might the 3D-printing method cut costs and reduce environmental damage?
7. How long did it take to print the house?
8. How much will it cost the tenants to live in the house?
9. What does the ‘rock’ design of the house show?
10. Apart from enabling affordable homes, what other benefit will 3D printing bring to buyers?
Key language
a. Match the verbs in the left-hand column with the nouns or noun phrases in the right-hand
column to make two-word expressions from the text.
1. traditional a. key
2. environmental b. frame
3. window c. market
4. external d. space
5. digital e. methods
6. whipped f. walls
7. rental g. cream
8. living h. damage
Discussion
a. Discuss these statements.
• “3D printing is the biggest development in design since the Industrial Revolution.”
• “In 10 years’ time, everything will be constructed using 3D printing.”
• “The problem is the cost of the equipment.”

Level: Advanced
6
In your own words
a. Open an Internet search engine and find at least 5 different uses for 3D printing or products
made by 3D printing.
Write a short report (around 200 words) using the information you have found.
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Key:
1. tenants
2. bunker
3. boulder
4. plot
5. nascent
6. proliferate
7. nozzle
8. overhanging
9. squirt
10. texture
11. bricklayer
12. touch
13. fairytale
14. affordable
3. Comprehension check
a. The answers given are only suggested answers
and students may correctly answer the questions
in different ways, e.g. in #1 they may simply say
‘electronically’ or similar.
Key:
1. By using a digital key.
2. France and the USA.
3.
It’s the first one where the load-bearing walls
have been made by 3D printing.
4. Overhanging external walls.
5. By adding layer upon layer.
6. By reducing the amount of cement that is used.
7. 120 hours.
8. €800 a month.
9.
That you can make any shape you want
to make.
10.
It will give them control over the shape of
their houses.
Level: Advanced – Teacher’s notes
Article summary: The article describes how
the first 3D-printed house in Europe was built.
Time: 45 – 60 minutes
Skills: Reading, Speaking, Writing
Language focus: Vocabulary
Materials needed: One copy of the
worksheet per student
1. Warmer
a. The purpose of this activity is to introduce the topic
of accommodation and get students thinking about
the advantages and disadvantages of different
types of accommodation. Ask students to put the
accommodation types into order from their favourite
to the one they like least and to think about their
reasons for choosing that order. Point out that
a terraced house is one that is part of a row of
buildings, so it has a building on either side of it
without any space between it and them.
2. Key words
a. Ask students to do the exercise individually and
then compare their answers in pairs or small groups.
Point out that a nozzle can also be found on their
home printers and is also the term used for the part
of a petrol pump that drivers insert into their petrol
tank when filling their car with fuel. Highlight the
fact that a tenant is someone who lives in a rented
property. People who live in properties they own
themselves are owner-occupiers. Point out that
‘finishing touch’ is usually used in the plural, as in
‘The artist was just applying the finishing touches
to the painting’. The word ‘nascent’ also collocates
with words such as industry, democracy and
political movement.

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Home Adults General English NEWS LESSONS
Level: Advanced – Teacher’s notes
6. In your own words
a. Ask students to open an Internet search engine and
enter either ‘uses of 3D printing’ or ‘products made
by 3D printing’. They should collect information about
at least five uses of 3D printing or products made
using this method. Encourage them to focus on uses
they find surprising. Both the preparation and the
writing could be done as homework activities.
The results could either be corrected as a piece of
writing or students could use the information to make
a short presentation about 3D printing to the group.
4. Key language
a. Students could be asked to do this exercise
individually and then compare their answers in pairs.
Note that ‘there is only one solution that uses all the
words. Ask students to refer back to the text to check
their answers.
Key:
1. e
2. h
3. b
4. f
5. a
6. g
7. c
8. d
5. Discussion
a. Allow students time to note down their ideas about
each statement and encourage them to say why they
agree or disagree with each one.

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